Nazi Propaganda Power

Using skillful propaganda, the Nazis brought German anti-Semitism to a fever pitch.

Hitler played heavily on the anti-Semitism already rooted within his people. He resurrected ideas that a previous German king, Frederick the Great, had introduced distinct categories of human beings. Essentially, the Germans were Aryans, and everyone else was sub-human. Hitler took these ideas and embellished them. He blamed the Jews for "two great wounds upon humanity: "Circumcision on the body and conscience on the soul."

As Hitler gained popularity, his hatred of Jews spread and became a rallying cry.

The Nazi propaganda paper, Der Sturmer, revived the "Blood Libels." The church warned its constituents: "Watch your children 6-7 weeks before Passover… Everyone knows that just before Passover Jews need the blood of a Christian child, maybe, to mix in with their matzah."

Der Sturmer ran contests encouraging German children to write in. One little girl wrote, "People are so bothered by the way we’re treating the Jews. They can’t understand it, because [Jews] are God’s creatures. But cockroaches are also God’s creatures, and we destroy them."

The anti-Jewish propaganda machine was led by Dr. Joseph Goebbels, head of Germany's Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. One of his creations was The Eternal Jew, a 1940 film which portrays Jews as uncivilized and parasitic – poorly dressed, dirty, sickly and malformed.

The film juxtaposes images of ghetto Jews with images of rats emerging from a sewer. The narrator describes Jews as the "vermin of the human race":

Where rats appear, they bring ruin by destroying mankind's goods and foodstuffs. In this way, they spread disease, plague, leprosy, typhoid fever, cholera, dysentery, and so on. They are cunning, cowardly and cruel and are found mostly in large packs. Among the animals, they represent the rudiment of an insidious, underground destruction – just like the Jews among human beings.

Using these propaganda methods, the German public was trained to support murderous activities against the Jews.

The Poisonous Mushroom

"The Toadstool" is a Nazi children's book designed to teach hatred of Jews. It was put out by Julius Streicher, the publisher of Der Stürmer who specialized in anti-Semitic propaganda. He was convicted in the Nuremberg trials, 1946, and executed for his role in the Holocaust.

A mother and her young boy are gathering mushrooms in the German forest. The boy finds some poisonous ones. The mother explains that there are good mushrooms and poisonous ones, and, as they go home, says:

"Look, Franz, human beings in this world are like the mushrooms in the forest. There are good mushrooms and there are good people. There are poisonous, bad mushrooms and there are bad people. We have to be on our guard against bad people just as we have to be on guard against poisonous mushrooms. Do you understand that?"

"Yes, Mother," Franz replies. "I understand that in dealing with bad people trouble may arise, just as when one eats a poisonous mushroom. One may even die!"

"And do you know, too, who these bad men are, these poisonous mushrooms of mankind?" the mother continued.

Franz slaps his chest in pride: "Of course I know, mother! They are the Jews! Our teacher has often told us about them."

The mother praises her boy for his intelligence, and goes on to explain the different kinds of "poisonous" Jews: the Jewish peddler, the Jewish cattle-dealer, the kosher butcher, the Jewish doctor, the baptized Jew, and so on.

"However they disguise themselves, or however friendly they try to be, affirming a thousand times their good intentions to us, one must not believe them. Jews they are and Jews they remain. For us, they are poison."

"Like the poisonous mushroom!" says Franz.

Just as a poisonous mushroom can kill a whole family, so too one Jew can destroy a whole city.

"Yes, my child! Just as a single poisonous mushroom can kill a whole family, so a solitary Jew can destroy a whole village, a whole city, even an entire Volk."

Franz has understood.

"Tell me, Mother, do all non-Jews know that the Jew is as dangerous as a poisonous mushroom?"

Mother shakes her head.

"Unfortunately not, my child. There are millions of non-Jews who do not yet know the Jews. So we have to enlighten people and warn them against the Jews. Our young people, too, must be warned. Our boys and girls must learn to know the Jew. They must learn that the Jew is the most dangerous poison-mushroom in existence. Just as poisonous mushrooms spring up everywhere, so the Jew is found in every country in the world. Just as poisonous mushrooms often lead to the most dreadful calamity, so the Jew is the cause of misery and distress, illness and death."

The author then concludes this story by pointing the moral:

German youth must learn to recognize the Jewish poison-mushroom. They must learn what a danger the Jew is for the German Volk and for the whole world. They must learn that the Jewish problem involves the destiny of us all.

The following tales tell the truth about the Jewish poison-mushroom... They show the depravity and baseness of the Jewish race. They show the Jew for what he really is: The Devil in human form.

summary from a 1938 publication issued by "Friends of Europe" in London

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Visitor Comments: 2

(2)
Albert Hache,
August 10, 2014 4:39 AM

The Nazis have redefined popular Islam

The wise men of Islam used the word “Jihad” to signify the war every decent human being must wage against his own passions. This noble meaning of the word has been hijacked by Islamo-Nazis to designate the fanciful necessity for dangerous bigots to destroy those who do not share their obtuse and barbaric beliefs. To better understand Hamas’ tactics it is necessary to refer to the Arabs’ close relationship with the Nazis.According to a specialist in modern German history at the University of Maryland, Jeffrey Herf, “Nazi propaganda for the Arab world”, (see Daniel Pipes’ Middle East forum) the influence of Nazism on the Arab world has been defining, is deep and palpable even today. Same rhetoric, same lies, same hatred and criminal intent against Jews.

(1)
Beverly Kurtin,
February 17, 2014 9:04 PM

It CAN happen again!

An unrecognized danger to the world is a Fascist people living adjacent to Israel: The Palestinians.They are using Nazi symbols, salutes, and even propagandizing their children with hate from the instant they are born. They call the Jews the descendants of Pigs and monkeys. Further, they are espousing EXACTLY the kind of hatred that the Nazis used to propagandize their children.Adolph Hitler was the originator of the BIG LIE. It is in his detestable book, “Mein Kamph.” Just tell an improbable lie over and over again until people begin to think it is true—that is how he turned one percent of the German population against us.The Polish people were all ready and set, nobody had to teach them to hate us. They did everything they could to make certain that every Jew was found and sent to the slaugher.However, there were righteous Germans and Poles who risked their own lives to save some of us, but the vast majority believed what they were told—and that is kind of enemy that we are facing in EVERY country that is involved in the BDS movement. They are gleefully accepting the Palestinian propaganda and the BIG LIES they tell, not unlike Faux “News.” The bigger the lies, the easier people succumb to the lies.Not being a psychologist, I don’t know why that is so, but it is. The Fascism that is being lauded by non-Arab countries are finding out what the inevitable result of their lambasting a true democracy and honoring Fascist groups that are run with heavy hands of dictators.Currently, the world is being blinded by Arab LIES so atrocious that it would be quite easy for another Germany to arise right here in the United States. Corporate Fascism already exists, it would not take all that much more to turn us into a Fascist State.

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I've been striving to get more into spirituality. But it seems that every time I make some progress, I find myself slipping right back to where I started. I'm getting discouraged and feel like a failure. Can you help?

The Aish Rabbi Replies:

Spiritual slumps are a natural part of spiritual growth. There is a cycle that people go through when at times they feel closer to God and at times more distant. In the words of the Kabbalists, it is "two steps forward and one step back." So although you feel you are slipping, know that this is a natural process. The main thing is to look at your overall progress (over months or years) and be able to see how far you've come!

This is actually God's ingenious way of motivating us further. The sages compare this to teaching a baby how to walk. When the parent is holding on, the baby shrieks with delight and is under the illusion that he knows how to walk. Yet suddenly, when the parent lets go, the child panics, wobbles and may even fall.

At such times when we feel spiritually "down," that is often because God is letting go, giving us the great gift of independence. In some ways, these are the times when we can actually grow the most. For if we can move ourselves just a little bit forward, we truly acquire a level of sanctity that is ours forever.

Here is a practical tool to help pull you out of the doldrums. The Sefer HaChinuch speaks about a great principle in spiritual growth: "The external awakens the internal." This means that although we may not experience immediate feelings of closeness to God, eventually, by continuing to conduct ourselves in such a manner, this physical behavior will have an impact on our spiritual selves and will help us succeed. (A similar idea is discussed by psychologists who say: "Smile and you will feel happy.")

That is the power of Torah commandments. Even if we may not feel like giving charity or praying at this particular moment, by having a "mitzvah" obligation to do so, we are in a framework to become inspired. At that point we can infuse that act of charity or prayer with all the meaning and lift it can provide. But if we'd wait until being inspired, we might be waiting a very long time.

May the Almighty bless you with the clarity to see your progress, and may you do so with joy.

In 1940, a boatload 1,600 Jewish immigrants fleeing Hitler's ovens was denied entry into the port of Haifa; the British deported them to the island of Mauritius. At the time, the British had acceded to Arab demands and restricted Jewish immigration into Palestine. The urgent plight of European Jewry generated an "illegal" immigration movement, but the British were vigilant in denying entry. Some ships, such as the Struma, sunk and their hundreds of passengers killed.

If you seize too much, you are left with nothing. If you take less, you may retain it (Rosh Hashanah 4b).

Sometimes our appetites are insatiable; more accurately, we act as though they were insatiable. The Midrash states that a person may never be satisfied. "If he has one hundred, he wants two hundred. If he gets two hundred, he wants four hundred" (Koheles Rabbah 1:34). How often have we seen people whose insatiable desire for material wealth resulted in their losing everything, much like the gambler whose constant urge to win results in total loss.

People's bodies are finite, and their actual needs are limited. The endless pursuit for more wealth than they can use is nothing more than an elusive belief that they can live forever (Psalms 49:10).

The one part of us which is indeed infinite is our neshamah (soul), which, being of Divine origin, can crave and achieve infinity and eternity, and such craving is characteristic of spiritual growth.

How strange that we tend to give the body much more than it can possibly handle, and the neshamah so much less than it needs!